It has come to light in the past 5 years that visceral fat is harmful to general health, whereas subcutaneous fat is not. Visceral fat is now viewed as not just an inert blob of fat, but as another endocrine organ, a “bad” endocrine organ. The visceral fat secretes chemical mediators which are believed to cause insulin resistance. Therefore visceral fat is now viewed as a culprit in the pathogenesis of diabetes mellitus type II. Also, visceral fat is suspected to be a possible contributor to cardiovascular disease, cancer, and even aging itself.
Liposuction, also known as lipoplasty (fat modeling), liposculpture, or suction lipectomy (suction-assisted fat removal) is a cosmetic surgery operation that removes subcutaneous fat from many different sites on the human body (e.g., the chest, buttocks, hips, thighs, or arms). The typical liposuction procedure relies on the shearing action of a sharp-edged instrument to shear away the fatty deposits. The sheared fatty deposits are then suctioned away into orifices on the cannula. This process is labor intensive for the surgeon, traumatic to the patient, and very time consuming.
Typical liposuction tools and methods cannot be used for visceral fat lipectomy in the same manner as they are used to remove subcutaneous fat, since visceral fat is attached to sensitive internal organs that will not tolerate the repeated thrusting and shearing required with traditional lipectomy.